Portable cards such as credit cards, identification cards, door opening cards and the like are now commonplace. A recent entry in the field of portable cards is the microcomputerized transaction card, i.e., a laminated plastic card which incorporates within itself a semiconductive microprocessor and memory adapted, when the card is inserted in a slot in a card holder, to interact with circuitry in the holder so as to be powered from the holder and to permit exchange of data between the microprocessor and memory therein and the holder circuitry.
The coupling between card and holder necessary for such interaction has most commonly taken the form of an electromechanical interconnection between them as, say, by providing for the holder a set of small pins adapted when the card is inserted into the holder slot to fit into a mating set of small holes formed in the card to thereby provide a jack-plug connection between card and holder. As a recent development, however, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 664,555 filed Oct. 25, 1984 in the name of R. L. Billings for "Flexible Inductor" and assigned to the assignee hereof and incorporated herein by reference, discloses an alternative arrangement for transferring electrical energy from the holder to a card therein to supply operating power and a clock signal to a microcomputer and memory in the card. In that alternative arrangement, the card includes a flexible inductor coil and a flexible ferromagnetic member adapted upon insertion of the card in the holder to inductively couple the coil to transformer primary means in the holder so that the coil will operate as a transformer secondary means and, in that role, transfer operating power and the clock signal to the microcomputer and memory in the card.
As an extension of that arrangement, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 700,152 filed Feb. 11, 1985 in the name of D. E. Haggan for "Computerized Transaction Card With Inductive Data Transfer" and assigned to the assignee hereof, and incorporated herein by reference, discloses the supplementing of the mentioned power-transfer coil included in a microcomputerized transaction card by other flexible inductor coils included in the same coil and adapted upon insertion of the card in the holder to be inductively. Coupled with other coils in the holder for exchange of data via such coupling between the card and holder.
Transaction card inductor coils of the sort described above are preferably of small diameter such as less than 1/2" (in order to take up little room in the card), flat (to avoid a bulge in the card), flexible (to be able to flex when the card is bent) and constituted of very small gauge wire. Moreover, preferably the leads for such a coil have and are kept, during manufacture of the card, in fixed positions relative to the body of the coil in order to facilitate later connection of such leads by automatic means to other circuit elements in the card. There is a need for manufacturing methods yielding inductor coils and leads therefor having such special features. Also there is a need for a methods of such kind which, to save time, expense and effort, are capable of producing such coils by assembly line techniques lending themselves to automation.